Life Among the Elms

The Fall of Rome

Thank you to all who came to our Rome celebration.  Your energy and enthusiasm at culminating events are hugely rewarding to our students.  It confirms their work and also solidifies the sense that learning is important and exciting.  I love watching them teach.

The experience of bringing a big event to fruition is a study in time management, personal goal setting, self control and initiative.  I've thought a lot about such big productions.  We talk so often about "process over product," it does make me wonder if something like our Rome culmination is too much.  But I think that the very fact that the event is much bigger than something any one person could pull off makes it very real.  Children are empowered to solve problems because,well, everyone else is so busy.

When we begin our planning, we set goals together about what we want to teach.  We brainstorm the different activities or events that could take place.  Then we divvy up the primary responsibilities and have a list of secondary and tertiary "extras."  We have class and individual calendars and "to do" lists that guide our daily work.  Each individual finishes his or her first responsibilities,  usually involving personal research, then takes on something from our other lists.  Over time, students learn that these "extras" make an event really special. (We call it "adding sparkle" - a left over from my marketing days).  Fifth graders working on their honors projects often use this same structure, excitedly sharing with me that they're finished with their "must dos" and get to do their "extras."

I was once chatting with a middle school teacher who mentioned a former Prairie Creek student's project.  She had really done a great job and he was wishing that he could give her extra credit to reward her.  I smiled.  I knew she had done a great job because she could do a great job and because it feels good to do a great job.  Doing a large event gives the students a tremendous sense of accomplishment -- they often mention their amazement that "they really did it!"  Setting audacious goals (and charting a just manageable course to get there) is key.  A little risk makes it all the more real and exciting.  Also, it just feels great to "wow" people.  Thanks for being such an appreciative audience and letting the Elms "wow" you.

How Does it Rate?

The past few weeks we've been exploring the idea of rates in our math class.  It's a simple concept, but one that is one of the most useful for everyday math situations.  If I can buy 3 hamsters for $5, how much would 9 hamsters cost?  If I can write three notecards in 15 minutes, how long will it take me to make 20?

We began our exploration by talking about the word "per" and thinking about rates we already use in our every day lives.  We've practiced using charts to help us solve problems involving rates.  We've talked about unit pricing, why it's usingful and how to find a unit price reliably.

This last item opened up into a discussion of calculator use and decimals.  We've talked a lot about what part of a number is "useful" for what we're doing and how to focus on whole numbers first, then work into the decimals for comparisons.  Our number one rule for looking at a calculator display screen is "Don't freak out, find the decimal point!"

We'll return to the idea of rates again and again throughout the year.  After all, a rate is a ratio, a ratio is a fraction...you get the idea.  To wrap up our current work, we've gone down to the Pit Stop to do some price comparisons.  Students are working out how much different products cost per serving and trying to convince their team which products they should buy with their budget.  (It was especially amusing today to listen to G.S. try to convince his group that a $1.89 single serve jaw breaker the size of a tennis ball was a good way to spend close to half the budget.)  We'll return to the Pit Stop on Friday to act on their decisions.

Look for opportunities to help your child practice rates:  allowance saving, recipe doubling, unit pricing, circular ads, speed limits.

What are your stories?

Ruth Sylte came and told stories to the class today.  She's done extensive family research and wove a tale about her grandparents and great grandparents separate journeys from Norway to the United States.  The Elms and Tamaracks were on the edge of their seats, laughing and exclaiming as the tale unfolded.  Ruth was a very skillful teacher and storyteller and, at the end when she revealed that she was the child in one of the pictures, the students were amazed.  "So that's how you knew all that stuff!"  "That's about the last person I would have expected!" said two Elms.  The class was still talking about it after lunch.

Ruth encouraged the students to start gathering their stories.  You might begin tonight at dinner.  Do you remember any of the stories your grandparents told you about their childhood?  (My grandmother used to sneak out of the bed she shared with her sister to get the funny section of the paper before her brothers could get it).  Have you shared stories about your own childhood or your parents?  The StoryCorps initiative has some wonderful questions to start (and record) a family conversation.

Leading the Way

This year, we've structured "reading buddies" a little differently.  We meet every Monday for lunch, then read together and then attend our All School Gathering.  As a staff, we wanted to deepen the relationship between the reading buddies and provide enough time for the pair to make a real connection.

It's been wonderful to watch the friendships develop.  A few kindergartners have even written notes to their buddies and some are joining in "older kid" recess games like football.  I've watched the Elms shepherd their charges through busy All School Gatherings, getting down on their knees to talk to them face to face.  On the Monday before Thanksgiving, we got together with our Aspen buddies to do block play.  It was such a good scene.

It's important for older kids to work with younger kids and to feel a responsibility to them.  We talk explicitly about their roles as a mentors and how they can be most effective helping younger kids.  Sadly, when we began these conversations in the fall, many Elms could remember a time when an older student had not been kind to them.  We agreed that sometimes, kids feel like now it's "their turn" to be bossy or mean.  We talked about the legacy they, the Elms, wanted to leave and we imagined the  same conversation I'd have with a future class of Elms in which nobody could remember an older kid ever being unkind to them.

Your children have been true leaders this year.  Ask them about their buddy and their leadership role in the school.

The Real McCoy

Yesterday, when I asked the Elms to share the oldest thing they'd ever touched, many wrote something like, "My Great Grandmother."  Today they're able to answer a little more dramatically.  Jon Buck came to our classroom and shared tiles, a lamp, a jar, a bronze statue, a toga tie, keys, rings and coins that he uncovered during his years as a world traveler.  He uses a state of the art metal detector (and some old fashioned history research) to unearth these treasures for universities, museums and governments.

I was surprised by my own reaction to holding such ancient items.  It was a thrilling connection to what  we've been learning.  It was so easy to imagine the family who used the same lamp two thousand years ago or traded with the same coin.  These are the kind of thing most of us only get to see behind glass in a museum, isolated and precious.  While they are certainly still precious, they seem so much more real now.

Mr. Buck gave us each a coin from the second century CE.  We broke out our magnifying glasses and played numismatic detective -- "is that a pig or a she-wolf?"  What a treasure (literally and figureatively.)

Guest Post from Cathy

Are you a member of the Polar Bear Club? I’m not. I’d very much like to be, but I haven’t earned my way in.  Membership is earned by counting the number of polar bears around the ice hole when five dice are rolled. A group of kids, Elizabeth and I crowded around Michelle to try and figure it out. A couple of the kids got it. Elizabeth got it. But I couldn’t get it. I watched my own reaction, realizing that this was a very valuable (if intensely uncomfortable) place for me to be. I considered cheating (surely, someone has spilled the beans on the internet). I thought of feigning disinterest (“I don’t care about this”). I have done neither of these things. I remain an outsider from a club I’d like to join.

 

As a teacher, I think it’s incredibly important for me to feel this frustration and use it to empathize with students. It helps me to understand the various reactions from students to a challenging math problem. Misbehavior masks confusion. The kid who protests the most (“I don’t care!”) may care the most. When I feel this frustration, the next step is to share with students how I’m feeling and how I deal with it. I want to model that learning isn’t always easy. It’s not as if some people are smart, and therefore find learning easy, and others are not smart and therefore struggle. Everyone is smarter in some ways than in others. Everyone who is open to learning new things will encounter frustrations. The big challenge is to live with the frustration and push through it. The rewards are great (I’ll get to make that polar bear roar someday!)

 

In discussing all this with Michelle, we moved to talking about why we enjoy teaching here so much. As teachers, we are constantly learning new things. We can’t possibly be expert in all of the topics that can (and do) emerge in a progressive school, so we are always reading, seeking people who can help us, and modeling for the kids what it means to be a learner. We have a responsibility to become expert and to lead the students, but we also have the opportunity to say (often) “I don’t know! What a great question. Let’s look that up.” We model our learning, which of course includes our frustration, our questions, our confusion. We also get to model how much fun it is to learn.

CTO